There was a hearing held Thursday in congress from 11:30am-about 3pm to investigate the safety of seafood from the Gulf of Mexico.

On Tuesday the 10th, the federal government started opening up water to fishers with an area of 5,144 square miles just off the Florida coast which has grown to include 31,000 across the gulf, based on the “BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Budget” authored by scientists from the National Oceanic Atmospheric Association and the United States Geological Survey that proposed most (about 75%) of the 4.9 million barrels of oil that spilled into the gulf from the Macondo well had been dispensed by a combination of natural processes and human, a.k.a. BP’s, efforts.

Congress is still on its month-long vacation. There was only one congress member there.

Rep. Edward Markey from Massachusetts, Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Energy and Environment yielded back the remainder of his time to Rep. Edward Markey, like a kid alley-ooping to himself on an adjustable rim. You might recognize Markey from the Waxman-Markey Energy Bill dubbed “cap-n-trade”, as well as his role as Ballbuster #3 to BP execs (especially former BP America President Lamar McKay).

Watch the “Hearing on ‘The BP Oil Spill: Accounting for the Spilled Oil and Ensuring the Safety of Seafood from the Gulf’” here for free!

A big clock lording over the mahogany veneer of the Rayburn House Office Building ticks: loud; lethargic; it simultaneously stagnates time while pushing it down slowly like thumb on a needle, injecting death so slowly and widely it’s impalpable to all in the room. An old congressman speaks in a microphone. He discusses the specifics of a simple algebraic ratio formula with the defendant seated below who is Bill Lehr.

Of the 4.1 million barrels that actually made it into the water.

I would need a calculator.

The other 800,000 never made it to the water. They went right to the ship…